


Two Broken People

by honeybreadbutterfly



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Adults, Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Real World, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Falling In Love, First Meetings, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, One Shot, POV Lydia Martin, Short, Strangers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-23
Updated: 2017-10-23
Packaged: 2019-01-21 20:23:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,612
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12465244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honeybreadbutterfly/pseuds/honeybreadbutterfly
Summary: Lydia and Stiles, two random strangers, that meet on a seemingly random day in a seemingly random motel..





	Two Broken People

Lydia and Stiles had never met. They didn’t even know that the other existed. But soon their paths would cross, neither of them aware just how much their lives were about to change.

It was some time in February. Lydia didn’t know, she had lost track of time. It was cold outside. Freezing to be more precise. She got up with a terrible headache. A tequila bottle was lying on the carpet floor. She groaned. Lydia didn’t remember getting to her room, nor did she remember what it looked like. Just another Motel room, on just another highway. That’s what her life had been like for the last three weeks. Short conversations, alcohol, dirty motel rooms and no memory of the previous night. Lydia went to the bathroom to take a shower and get dressed. After all she had to leave in less than two hours again, hitting the road once more, driving without a real destination.

She put her wet hair into a bun because the blow dryer didn’t work and she quite frankly didn’t care wether she’d catch a cold or not. She put on a loose jumper and the leggings she had worn the day before and the day before that as well. For breakfast she ate a muesli bar she still had in her purse. It tasted like it had been in there for a while, only god knew how old it really was.

Lydia threw in an aspirin against the headache and packed her stuff, ready to leave again. She was just carrying a duffle bag. That was all she had, all she owned at this point. Some clothes, cash, two books, one necklace, a foto, her toothbrush and toothpaste and her wallet. That was all. All she took with her at least.

She inhaled deeply, preparing herself for the cold that awaited her outside. The cold breeze cooled down her head instantly. She already regretted not having waited for her hair to dry. But she didn’t have time. She had to stick to the schedule. Trembling she sped to the office, to pay her one day stay and leave again, but she wasn’t the first one to check out.

In front of her stood a young man, mid twenties maybe. He was paying cash. Quite a lot actually. He must have stayed there over a week to pay this much. Lydia wondered what his story was, but couldn’t think about it for any longer, as it was her turn now, the young brown haired leaving.

She absent-mindedly handed over the money, looking over her shoulder to watch the young man leave. He turned left and vanished out of sight. She turned back again, taking her change and leaving as well. She didn’t even say goodbye, but neither did the Motel owner, so she didn’t feel to bad about it.

Some part of her was still wondering how it had gotten this far. Happy childhood, popular girl in high school, valedictorian, best in college. And now she was 26, sleeping in disgusting flophouses, living off of muesli bars.

She got into her car, her fingers and ears red from the cold. Her muscles started trembling again. She tried to start her car, but it died. She tried again, but it still didn’t start. After the seventh time she breaks out in tears. Somehow the sadness and exhaustion caught up with her and the car not starting simply triggered her mental breakdown. Not that it was her first.

Lydia hated crying. It made her feel weak and vulnerable. She wanted to scream so bad, but couldn’t. Everything around her seemed to be falling apart. Everything she thought she knew and everything she thought she was, suddenly not there anymore. Just gone. In one little moment.

A knock on her window made her jump. Embarrassed she recognised the young brown haired. He looked at her concerned.

“Do you need help?”, he asked.

Lydia didn’t want to talk to him, she didn’t want to talk to anyone, but she did need help. Drying her tears, she put on a fake smile and opened the window.

“Do you know by chance how to jump start a car?”, Lydia asked in the sweetest tone she could muster.

He sighed, looking at her car. “I can try.”, he offered.

And he did try. For half an hour at least, but the car wouldn’t start. Lydia’s desperation grew inside her stomach. She could feel fresh tears burning in her eyes. She didn’t want to cry, not in front of him. But it was already to late, he had already noticed the look on her face.

“Can I take you somewhere. Do you have anyone to call?”, he asked concerned.

Lydia shook her head. She didn’t trust her voice not to break so she tried to avoid to speak.

“You know what. You look like you didn’t have breakfast yet either. Let’s just get some coffee, you look tired.”

Lydia was about to decline, but then reconsidered. What else could she do? She hadn’t eaten a proper meal in days and she wasn’t going anywhere with that piece of trash of a car, so to her and also his surprise, she agreed.

“I’m Stiles, by the way.”, he threw in before starting his car.

A weird name, Lydia thought, but didn’t ask because she was too tired and she didn’t want to sound rude, as he did just try helping her for over half an hour. 

“Lydia.”, she gave back, her voice still a bit croaky.

They barely talked during the car ride. Only when they got to the diner and Lydia noticed all the pink hearts on the windows and the heart shaped balloons floating inside, she found her voice again.

“Is it Valentine’s Day?”, she asked perplex.

Stiles laughed.

“Good call Sherlock.”, he replied, a grin on his face.

For some reason, and Lydia would repeat this moment in her head over and over even years after, this was what broke the ice for her. For some reason, this little snarky remark made all the difference.

She followed him to a booth that was unoccupied and sat down opposite him. An obnoxiously pink balloon was floating right above them. The waitress came over and asked wether they wanted the Valentine’s special. Lydia was about to decline, but Stiles spoke first.

“Yes please.”, he answered confidently, and the waitress left without even bothering to look at Lydia.

Stiles noticed Lydia’s obvious confusion and slight annoyance.

“Don’t worry, I’ll pay and I’m also not trying to hit on you. Not that I normally wouldn’t, because let’s be honest, you are totally my type, but the specials mostly taste better than the dull rest and I’m looking neither for a relationship nor a hookup.”, he rambled in one go.

Lydia just laughed. She started to like this guy.

“Well neither do I.”, she stated and that was the end of that discussion.

Their “date”, which back then it wasn’t, but years later they decided that it was, wasn’t anything special. Just two broken people sitting in a diner, eating strawberry pancakes in the shape of hearts, on a “date-but-actually-not-a-date”.

Back then Lydia didn’t tell Stiles that her boyfriend of ten years, who had also been her fiancé for about a year, Jackson, had been cheating on her for years. She didn’t tell him that she only found out because she caught him redhanded. Lydia didn’t tell the boy in front of her how this ruined her completely and made her end up in dozens of Motel, with more than a dozen of drinks. Back then she didn’t tell him, that she was trying to outrun her feelings because she thought that she wouldn’t ever find love again. No, she didn’t tell him any of that.

And neither did Stiles tell Lydia about his father, who had died two months prior. He didn’t tell her about the fight they had had and how guilty he felt about it. He didn’t tell her about his fear of being alone, so ever since his dad’s funeral he hadn’t been at home, because he couldn’t bare the thought of him not being in this house. He didn’t tell her all the things he would have wanted to tell his dad and he didn’t tell her about the pain he felt, when he thought of home.

Back then they talked about food and traveling, books and movies. Talked about gossip and politics, religion and shoes trends. They talked about all the unimportant stuff, yet still it appeared that talking about the unimportant was most important to them in that moment.

It was this breakfast that brought them together. Two people looking for something, not sure what it was but definitely looking. And suddenly they found each other. Just another random person, in another random Motel, on another random day.

But it’s not a random person and it’s not a random Motel and it most definitely wasn’t a random day. Some call it fate, some call it coincidence. They simply called it their tiny miracle.

Because after the breakfast they had, they ended up leaving Lydia’s car on the parking lot of that ruddy Motel and continued their journey together. They weren’t looking for love, but they found it.

Looking back, they’d say that even though it was the weirdest Valentine’s Day either of them ever had, it was also the best. No romance, no roses, no heart eyes and chocolates. Just two strangers meeting, crossing paths, finding hope in what they believed a hopeless place. Two broken people, not able to mend their own wounds, but able to mend the other’s.


End file.
